Doctors may know a lot about medicine, but may be on less secure ground with the business side of healthcare, writes Tom Avril for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Drexel University professor David E. Stein hoped to remedy that with a series of 10 monthly courses for physicians in the Crozer-Keystone Health System.

The program focuses specifically on the business needs of doctors; making sure a hospital has the right number of beds, justifying the expense of a new robotic surgery center.

Called the Physician Leadership Academy, the program is in its second year, created by Drexel faculty members at the request of Crozer-Keystone executives.

Attending physicians do not get credit toward a Drexel MBA degree. But  the course counts toward continuing medical education credits that they are required to fulfill.

Joyann Kroser, a gastroenterologist in the health system’s Brinton Lake outpatient surgery center in Glen Mills, said Stein’s class had been valuable so far. But she said that in some ways, the field of medicine is unique.

“We don’t want to treat patients like a commodity,” she said. “At the heart of it, we’re still doctors, treating human beings who are coming in with a problem.”

Read more about doctors brushing up on business here.

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